If you’re wondering “why would you need refrigerated trailer hire?”, there are a number of reasons from emergency support to additional capacity. Today, we’ll explore how refrigerated trailer hire works, why you might need it, the impact on the environment and more in this compressed guide.
1. What is a refrigerated trailer?
A refrigerated trailer is a towing-capable box accessory with a cooled interior. It can come in many shapes and sizes to suit the needs of your storage. Common items to store in a refrigerated trailer are medicine, food or drink and flowers. You can rent a refrigerated trailer for a set period of time or buy one to own. Rental is perhaps more common due to their typical usage as temporary cold storage for pubs, bars, restaurants, food stalls, markets and the like. They lock securely keeping your goods safe and most can be remotely controlled to keep items within their legal holding temperatures.
2. What are they good for?
Refrigerated trailers are ideal for keeping flowers, food and medicine at the correct cool temperatures according to legal limits. They are better than a cooler or icebox because they are powered by the mains. This means your goods can be kept cold essentially indefinitely. That makes them a popular choice for party catering, pub events, festivals, temporary storage, longer-term storage or as a backup for restaurant fridges and the like. Since they are lockable, they make good overnight storage solutions. And many of them are adjusted by remote control making it easy to set and maintain the correct temperature.
3. How much is refrigerated trailer hire?
In general, expect to pay £275.00 + VAT for a weekend hire or £325.00 + VAT per week. A very popular size is the mid-tier with 9’3’’ x 6’0’’ x 6’6’’ of space, secure lockup and non-slip safety surfaces inside. This size is towable by most vans and 4×4s with cooling from a small box trailer that’s not bulky or unsightly. Make sure to find a refrigerated trailer hire company with a 24-hour emergency call line and quick set-up service. This is important if something were to fail and you needed to get a replacement to your door asap. As you well know, when foods go out of safe temperature for more than the permitted time on the label, it’s a health risk to serve them. Bromley Council explains, “It is a criminal offence to use food that is not fit for people to eat. By using spoiled, out-of-date or unsafe food, you are risking your customers’ health and your reputation. If in doubt, throw it out.” And that’s true for medicines as well. For flowers, it’s likely that the quality will be damaged by unsuitable storage and customers will be less likely to purchase them leading to wastage.
4. How does a refrigerated trailer work?
A refrigerated trailer doesn’t work too differently from your fridge at home. Park it on flat, level ground, plug it into the mains and set the cooling level with the remote control or on the panel. The cooling system will chill the air inside and expel warm air outside. Load it with your goods and lock it securely when not in active use. Your refrigerated trailer rental firm should come and set up the box trailer for you using a 16amp single phase 3 pin commando plug or standby power so it’s one less thing for you to worry about doing yourself.
5. What are the running costs of a refrigerated trailer?
Depending on your energy tariff, the running cost of a refrigerated trailer is nominal at a few pence per hour. For most food services, catering, festival and market operations, this represents a negligible cost. The key with any refrigerated trailer is reliability and fast service. After all, if the cooling does fail, you’ll have a limited time to resume correct cooling procedures or count all your stock as wastage. The only real cost to consider is the upfront rental prices of around £275.00 + VAT for a weekend hire or £325.00 + VAT per week. And unlike traditional refrigerated vans, trailers are all-electric and don’t produce CO emissions while they are in operation. This is better for the environment and complies with clear air regulations across the UK.
6. What can you store in a refrigerated trailer?
A refrigerated trailer is great for storing anything that needs to be cooled in order to prevent bacteria from growing within it or warm temperatures from damaging it. These could be items like flowers, medicine, ice sculptures, beverages, meals, chemicals and more. With a refrigerated trailer, you simply tow the box truck to where you need it and hook it up to the mains. Then you set the cooling to the temperature you need it at and load your goods. The Food Standards Agency recommends 5c or below for food. It’s between 2c and 8c for medicines and the same for flowers.
7. Are refrigerated trailers okay for the environment?
Refrigerated trailers are great for the environment. First, they don’t use petrol or diesel as fuel. So they don’t create emissions. Then, they get all of their power from electricity. In the UK, around 43% of our electricity comes from renewable sources with the goal of 100% by 2035. Lastly, it helps to prevent food & other wastage which means those products and the energy used to make them didn’t go to waste. Preventing food waste is really important as it represented over 35% of carbon emissions in 2019 alone. So, by making sure all your goods are sellable and none go off, you’re preventing useless carbon emissions and helping the planet.
8. Summary
Why would you need a refrigerated trailer hire? There are many reasons from on-site energy backups to festival catering. They are a green solution that’s low-cost to run and better for the planet than traditional fridge vans. And they’re great for a range of products from drinks to medicine and more. With a lot of cooling in a small form factor, they’re easy to install almost anywhere too.
